Having attained their goal in 2016 of allowing those committing adultery through invalid second “marriages” to receive Holy Communion, “progressive” Catholics have been quick to set out their plans for Pope Francis. Here are their top four goals for 2017.

1. Allowing Protestants to receive Holy Communion.

Buoyed by his success in attaining communion in “special circumstances” for divorced and remarried Catholics Cardinal Kasper has expressed the hope that Pope Francis’s next declaration will allow Protestants “in special circumstances” to recieve Holy Communion. Cardinal Kasper confided his next goal to the newspaper of the Italian bishops’ conference:

“I hope that the next declaration opens the way for shared Eucharistic communion in special cases. Personally, I hope that we can use an unofficial text, prepared by a commission in the bishops’ conference of the United States, regarding this subject.”

In 2015 Pope Francis responded to a question about Protestants receiving communion from a Lutheran woman married to a Catholic, “There are questions that only if one is sincere with oneself and the little theological light one has, must be responded to on one’s own.” Since the Holy Father’s ambiguous response there have been reports of Lutherans presenting themselves for Holy Communion.

2. Allowing laicised, married priests to return to priestly ministry.

Leonardo Boff, the married, former Franciscan priest, said in an interview published on Christmas Day that Pope Francis may soon fulfil the Brazilian bishops’ request to allow laicised, married priests to resume their priestly ministry. He confided that this would not make much difference to his situation because, even though he is married, he continues to celebrate Mass and administer the sacraments, with the encouragement of his bishop. Boff told the German daily Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger.

“The Brazilian bishops, especially the pope’s close friend Cardinal Claudio Hummes, have expressly requested Pope Francis to enable married priests in Brazil to return to their pastoral ministry,” Boff said. “I have recently heard that the pope wants to fulfil this request — as an experimental, preliminary phase for the moment confined to Brazil.”

It is reported that Pope Francis was keen that the synod in 2018 should examine priestly celibacy and “a possible push to allow married priests”. However, according to Edward Pentin, “That proposal was understood to have been voted down by the majority of members on the XIV Ordinary Council of the Synod of Bishops.” Since this decision, Pope Francis has made it known that the 2018 will examine the problem of “lack of vocations”, which may provide an opening for the question of relaxing the requirement of celibacy for ordination to the priesthood.

3. The ordination of women to the diaconate.

In 2005 the International Theological Commission published a report that concluded that deaconesses in the early Church did not participate in some form of holy orders and were not equivalent to deacons. However, in 2016 Pope Francis’s appointed a commission to study the question of ordaining women to the diaconate.

Phyllis Zagano, a well-known advocate for women’s ordination to the diaconate, was appointed a member of Pope Francis’s commission. According to Lifesite News “she has spoken at events sponsored by organizations that promote women’s ordination to the priesthood.”

4. Pope Francis acting against Cardinal Burke. Again.

The “progressive” Catholics hope that Pope Francis will act against Cardinal Burke. Cardinal Burke, as the courageous and outspoken defender of the Catholic faith, is much disliked by “progressives”. Christopher Lamb of the radically “progressive” Catholic newspaper The Tablet wrote on the 23rd December 2016:

“Francis made Cardinal Burke patron of the order in 2014 as a way of getting him out of running the Church’s supreme court and blocking the Pope’s reforms to the marriage annulment process.

But with the “dubia” saga and now this latest dispute the cardinal continues to cause headaches for the Pope. And if Burke is found to have overstepped his role and remit as patron of the order of Malta, then Francis may have no choice but to move him once again.”

7 comments on “Riding high after Amoris Laetitia, the “progressives” have plans for Pope Francis in 2017”

After having “extended” Wojtyla’s Familiaris Consortio, Francis might want to extend his “Theology of the Body.” Ideas include “omega-point sexuality” or “ontology of eroticism,” adapting Freud, the Enneagram, and Jungian dominatrix epistemology.

Spock: Fascinating, Captain. Projection and scapegoating are habits which progressives indulge in quite frequently. It appears that Cardinal Burke has been cast in the same role which Cardinal Ratzinger used to hold, as favorite boogieman of progressive modernists.

Captain Kirk: But in all their virtue signaling shouldn’t the passing of Princess Leia have touched their hearts enough to want to extend the year of mercy even for Cardinal Burke?

Spock: Affirmative, Captain. But in their neurotic need to vilify Cardinal Burke, they have abandoned that.

Grand Moff Tarkin: I assure you that Lord Vader has grown tired of being scapegoated by you, young lady! You and your progressive friends are about to be taught a lesson in the hermeneutics of scapegoating and liberal political correctness!

Mike Brady: That’s it, Carol! Don’t you see, they’re scapegoating Cardinal Burke just the way the kids were scapegoating and teasing Jan over wearing that crazy wig!

Carol: I don’t know, Mike. If the ultraconservatives had their way I’d have to go off the Pill and we’d have at least six more kids running around the house.

Father Mulcahy, S.J.: Technically, divine mercy would also apply to the Holy Father’s conservative and traditionalist critics. Of course, the Pill is still forbidden, Mrs. Brady.

Enik: Mr. Rick Marshall, you are a man of reason and science, deeply familiar with the ideology of pragmatism and scientism, are you are not?

Rick Marshall: Gee, I suppose so. I read National Geographic, Popular Mechanics, and Field and Stream.

Mike: What? Carol, I thought you were enlightened. It’s “Francis Livingston Seagull,” the ultimate in omega-point convergence. Look here, and you can see how hard Francis works to enlighten us and lead us up into the noosphere:

“Overcome space, and all we have left is Here. Overcome time, and all we have left is Now.”

“We can lift ourselves out of ignorance, we can find ourselves as creatures of excellence and intelligence and skill.”

“Heaven is not a place, and it is not a time. Heaven is being perfect.”

“Francis sighed. The price of being misunderstood, he thought. They call you devil or they call you god.”

“Don’t believe what your eyes are telling you. All they show is limitation. Look with your understanding. Find out what you already know and you will see the way to fly.”

Woody: Well, Mike and Carol find themselves in an awkward situation. Fortunately, we have Professor Marshall McLuhan right here to explain the semiotics and hermeneutics underlying modernity to help us understand this process.

Professor Gadamer: Did someone mention hermeneutics?

Bob Dylan: Mike needs to find out what his Enneagram number is. When Mike figures out what his Enneagram number is, then he and Carol can get their chakras aligned correctly and work through their conflicts. Then everything will be cool, man.

Tom Wolfe: Of course, the Teilhardian noösphere was an early anticipation of the internet.

But while we’re on this discussion of hermeneutics and modernity, to keep the Tortoise and Hare Race more interesting, Father Mulcahy should ask Kwai Chang Caine and Spicoli what their Enneagram numbers are. That way it will have an authentic progressive modernist feel to it.

Spicoli: Whoa! You must be working for Mister Hand!

Father Mulcahy, S.J.: Fortunately, there is an expert teaching a course on the Enneagram at Fordham this semester…

Master Po: Ah, Grasshopper, your meditations on Zen and Lao-Tzu have sharpened the art of questioning. If a caterpillar hears a Shelby Mustang convertible racing down the highway at 95 miles per hour which hexagram from the I Ching would indicate a more favorable opportunity to cross the road?

Captain Kirk: Mister Spock, did Teilhard de Chardin know his own Enneagram number?

Spock: Fascinating, Captain. If you will permit me to consult the ship’s computer, perhaps we can determine whether Teilhard’s awareness of his Enneagram number is within the realm of established knowledge. It could give a whole new direction to progressive modernist theology.

Professor Jürgen Habermas: What about my book? Has the Pope read my book yet?

The Professor: Why, yes, Gilligan. Professor Jürgen Habermas is one of the most prominent Continental European philosophers. In fact, Pope Benedict once engaged in a philosophical discussion on the nature of reason with Professor Habermas.

Ginger: Gilligan is getting ready to take the neo-Kantian Transcendental Turn!

Mary Ann: It’s very exciting. I just hope he remembers the directions to Louvain!

Dr. Bob Hartley: OK, Emily. We can finish talking about my dream later.
What did you want to talk about?

Emily: Bob, do you think we should start having some children?

Ann: Who’s Jürgen Habermas?

Elvis: This might take a while, Sugar Baby! So hold on!
Well, Jürgen Habermas is a Frankfurt School sociologist and philosopher from the universities of Göttingen , Zürich , and Bonn, who studied under the critical theorists Max Horkheimer and Theodor Adorno at the Johann Wolfgang Goethe University Frankfurt am Main Institute for Social Research, researching the foundations of social theory and epistemology in order to articulate postmodern theories on communicative rationality and the public sphere.

Ann: Oh, that’s interesting. So what does Geworfenheit mean?

Chrissy: What does Geworfenheit mean, Jack?

Jack: Well, Chrissy, you see, Martin Heidegger was puzzling over Duns Scotus for his college thesis after he was kicked out of the Jesuits and…since it’s always fun to invent a new school of philosophy….

It is with sorrow that I am writing to let you know that Bishop Campbell, the Bishop of Lancaster, has refused Nick’s request to resume news posting on Protect the Pope. Bishop Campbell has also stated that he does not want anyone posting on Protect the Pope on Nick’s behalf …